The Southern Comfort Food of My Dreams at Monell’s in Nashville

A Nashville Institution

Located in Nashville’s Germantown neighborhood on the bottom floor of a 150-year-old Victorian house, Monell’s is an old-world charmer serving the Southern comfort food of your dreams. Diners share large communal tables and a seemingly endless parade of family-style food, so be prepared to get to know your neighbors. And never fret, if the guy next to you snags the last drumstick, you can guarantee there’s more coming fresh from the kitchen. Dishes arrive by the dozen, starting with salads (they make the best tomato-onion salad in the South), followed by green beans, squash casserole, piles of biscuits, corn pudding, fried chicken, smothered pork chops, country ham, dessert and plenty of sweet tea to wash it down. Everything I tasted was better than what came before it. There’s a different specialty every day of the week, from Monday’s chicken and dumplings to the epic “chef’s choice” after-church Sunday meal. If you can follow the house rules—pass the bowls to the left and no cell phones at the dinner table—you’re in for a real treat at this Nashville institution.